Medicine made me a cross-dressing, sex-mad gambler

A former councillor told on Monday how his life was ruined when a new drug for Parkinson’s disease turned him into a gambling transvestite.

‘Obsessed’: Pete Shepherd ran up £400,000 debts (Picture: Masons)

Pete Shepherd claimed he changed from a married IT worker into a sex-obsessed fraudster after his GP prescribed him Cabergoline to help ease his symptoms.

But the side-effects saw him run up £400,000 debts on expensive cars, luxury holidays and casinos while he maxed out 15 credit cards. He also lost his wife, a £50,000-a-year job and his home.

‘I became obsessed with gambling, spending, sexual excess and various fetishes,’ said Mr Shepherd, who was diagnosed with Parkinson’s in 2001.

‘I suffered from delusions of grandeur. I was out day and night at racecourses, betting shops, casinos and brothels,’ he added. The 60-year-old said he also developed a ‘transvestite tendency’ as he splashed out on womens’ lingerie, stilettos and boots.

‘Sometimes I’d go out in the car at 3am with a case full of ladies clothes, find some remote lay-by or picnic area and spend perhaps a couple of hours dressing up, walking round outside the car, then try on a different outfit, and so on,’ he said.

Mr Shepherd, a former councillor from Hull, also posed as a millionaire on a Caribbean cruise on the QEII, acting ‘like James Bond’ as he toured the world.

But he said his life returned to normal after he stopped taking the drugs in 2008.

Mr Shepherd received a conditional discharge for a £45,000 eBay fraud last year after a judge ruled that responsibility for his actions was ‘very substantially’ reduced by the side-effects of the drug.

Dr Kieran Breen, of Parkinson’s UK, said he was aware of the link between some dopamine agents, a group including Cabergoline, and compulsive behaviour.

The symptoms ‘appear to subside if the drug is withdrawn or changed’, he added.